London has been battered by 50mph winds that have felled trees and caused travel chaos. Powerful gusts swept across the capital as the Met Office issued a yellow "be aware" weather alert for most of the country.

Nearly three years on, the Gulf of Mexico oil spill continues to dominate BP’s agenda.

The FTSE 100 oil giant today announced a 19% drop in its 2012 profits to $17.6 billion (£11.2 billion) as it took a further $4.1 billion charge in the fourth quarter relating to the explosion on the Horizon rig in April 2010.

The blast resulted in 11 deaths and spilled an estimated five million barrels of oil into the Gulf.

The charge dealt a further blow to BP’s bottom line, which was already suffering from a decline in production after the company sold a wide range of businesses to finance compensation claims.

These include BP’s 50% stake in its troubled Russian oil joint venture TNK-BP to Rosneft for $28 billion in cash and shares and the Carson oil refinery in California.

BP said it had divested a total of $37.8 billion of businesses since 2010, excluding the TNK-BP deal, which is expected to be formally completed in the first half of the year.

It has taken a cumulative net charge for the Gulf of Mexico of $42.2 billion, with the latest charge mostly related to a recent out-of-court settlement that resolves all federal criminal charges stemming from the incident.

BP chief executive Bob Dudley sought to draw a line under the incident today, acknowledging that times have been tough lately but insisting that the company was in good shape.

“We have moved past many milestones in 2012, repositioning BP through divestments and bringing on new projects. This lays a solid foundation for growth into the long term,” he said.

But the Gulf of Mexico looks set to continue to dominate the proceedings in the coming weeks as BP is preparing to face its biggest case over the spill of all later this month. BP said it continued to work towards a settlement over the civil case, due to begin in New Orleans on February 25, “but only on reasonable terms” and said that it “continues to prepare for the civil trial”.

If it goes ahead, the case will determine how much oil was spilt, who is to blame for the incident and whether BP was negligent or grossly negligent. If BP is found to have been negligent, it could be liable for a maximum penalty of $4.5 billion from the Clean Water act alone. If grossly negligent, that could soar to $21 billion.

BP also reported its fourth-quarter figures today, with profits fell by a fifth to $4 billion. The group’s full-year figures also suffered from wage and equipment inflation in the oil and gas sector and higher investment as BP looked to boost its output in the wake of the asset sales. BP’s shares increased by 8.5p to 470.55p as results came in slightly ahead of expectations and the company announced a There is a 10% rise in the full-year dividend to 16.67p a share.